Heart Attitude of Giving to Receive

When you buy something it's an exchange. You expect to get something for your money. But what about when you give? Hi, I'm Rob West. Christians are called to be generous towards God's Kingdom. There's no question about that.

But should we expect something in return? I'll talk about that first today and then it's on to your calls at 800-525-7000. That's 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith & Finance Live! Biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Now, reaping bountifully does not mean that God must reward you monetarily for your generosity. You cannot make God a debtor.

He already owns everything. But it does mean that God will bless you. But that blessing can come in any form that God chooses. You have a problem with your heart attitude when you expect, or demand, material blessing from God for your generosity. This takes the form of sins like greed and covetousness, not to mention arrogance, but also a gaping lack of gratitude for what God has already given you.

This is far more prevalent than you might think. Consider the so-called prosperity gospel, with its doctrine of name it and claim it. Its teachers quote the Bible freely, but twist the meaning of certain verses to support their claims. An example of this would be James 4-2, which reads, The prosperity gospel would have you believe that all you have to do is to ask God for something, anything, and He'll give it to you. But it ignores the very next verse that says you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions. 1 John 5-14 tells us the right way to bring our supplications to God. It says, This is the confidence that we have before Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.

When your heart aligns with God's, you can never ask for anything He doesn't already want to give you. Matthew 19-29 is also twisted around to mean that God must reward your giving with greater financial reward. It reads, And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. But the hundredfold increase that this verse promises is not material wealth, but fellowship with thousands of other believers here and in eternity.

Yes, there is a return and far greater than anything we could ever give, but it's not money. In fact, the Bible and Jesus in particular promised something quite different, that there is a cost for being His disciple. In John 15-20, Jesus warns, Remember the word that I said to you.

A servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. Jesus promises tribulation, not prosperity. Make no mistake, by any name, the prosperity gospel is an aberration of Orthodox Christian theology. It claims that God will reward you with material wealth according to your faith. So as your faith increases, so will your wealth.

Of course, Scripture promises no such thing. The prosperity gospel is a modern heresy. It crept into a few local congregations and tent revivals after World War II, but eventually found its way to radio and television, leading untold numbers astray by the 1980s, and giving the word televangelism a negative effect. And while it started in the U.S., it's now found around the world.

Not surprisingly, it's spread faster in areas with great poverty, such as Africa, South America, and anywhere people struggle to make a living. As with any false doctrine, we must be vigilant to keep the prosperity gospel out of our churches. Theologian John Piper has identified several common traits to watch out for.

Here are two. The absence of doctrine related to suffering. Remember Jesus' warnings about the cost of discipleship. The absence of detailed exposition of Scripture.

In other words, cherry-picking verses without giving their context. To sum up, you should expect something in return for your generosity, God's blessing that enables you to do good works that glorify Him, not material wealth for your own pleasure. Your calls are next.

800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live. Stick around. So thankful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live.

I'm Rob West. All right, it's time to take your calls and questions today on anything financial, whatever you're thinking about in your financial life today, whether it's your living expenses, maybe it's your giving, that what you owe, or that what you're trying to grow for the future. We'd love to hear about it, talk about it, run it through the next couple of weeks. Talk about it, run it through a lens of biblical wisdom that we find in God's Word. The number to call today, 800-525-7000. Again, that's 800-525-7000.

We've got some lines open. You know, here on this program, we want to help you think each day with an eternal perspective. It's very easy to get focused on the things of this world. The reality is we'll leave it all behind and everything will ultimately be destroyed. I think the key is, can we live not focused on the temporal, but can we keep our eyes fixed on what is to come and that which will last? Here's what the psalmist observed in Psalm 49, 16 to 19. The psalmist writes, You see, this life is brief, folks. We're reminded of that clearly in the scriptures.

It's called, but a vapor. And so our opportunity is not to have our eyes fixed on the here and now, the temporal, which is fleeting, but on that which will last. And we can, in fact, store up treasures in heaven. That's the treasure principle that we see clearly in scripture. We can send it on ahead and we should do that, recognizing one of the primary purposes for God entrusting wealth to us is to be generous. You see, we understand that it's to provide for ourselves and our family. The challenge is, if we start there, we are an unending list of needs and wants such that we may not get beyond ourselves to see our real opportunity. And that is to be the hands and feet of Jesus, to bless the people on our paths, to be connected, hardwired into God's activity through our generosity.

What an opportunity we have as we hold God's resources loosely. So let's together develop and cultivate that eternal perspective as we look at our role as stewards and managing God's money. That's what we do each afternoon when we gather together on this program.

But we also want to tackle through that lens the very specific questions that you're wrestling with in your financial life. So give us a call today. We'd love to hear from you again. We have a few lines open. The calls are coming in quickly. 800-525-7000. Again, that's 800-525-7000.

A quick email that, or excuse me, a call that came in from somebody that didn't want to be on the air. They simply asked, how can I discover the value of my Series EE or Series I bonds? How can I change the beneficiary and how can I redeem them if they mature? Well, the one-stop shop to go for all of that information for our caller is treasurydirect.gov. That's the Treasury's website where you can not only get the value of any bond, whether that's electric, these are government bonds of course, which Series EE and Series I are. Whether they're electronic or paper, you'll just type in the QSIP number. That will give the information that's needed for the value of those bonds to be given to you.

You can in fact change the beneficiary there at treasurydirect.gov. And you can redeem them. And by the way, for our caller, you do not need to wait till they mature. You can redeem those early.

You may have a small penalty, so make sure you take a look at that. Thanks for calling us today. All right. All the lines are full. Let's dive in today. We're going to begin in Chattanooga. Hi, Randy. Go right ahead.

Hey, thank you for your ministry. My question is, I'm trying to pay my mortgage off by the first of next year. It's about $26,000, so we're making double payments on it. And I plan to pay it off in January, try to get the last little bit I can out of it for this year and pay it off in January, which I know is not going to be much. Or I have a 457 and I could actually take the money out and pay it off now.

And I was just wondering, what did you think about option A or option B? Yeah. So how far are you away from retirement? I'm retired right now.

Okay, got it. And what is the balance on the mortgage? It's about $26,000. All right. And how much do you have in that 457 plan? About $300.

Okay. And you said if you just continue on the current track of paying a little bit extra out of your current cash flow, you would expect to pay it off by when? By January of 24, we're paying a double payment on it now. We pay $1,200 and we're paying $2,500. And I'll be close enough in January to take some money out of my savings, my regular savings, and just pay it off. Okay. You know, I much prefer that option, Randy.

I mean, I'm with you. I want that paid off as quick as you can get it paid off. But I'd rather not do that by pulling money out of the 457 plan because that's, first of all, all going to be taxable to you. Secondly, that 457, like everybody else's retirement plan, is probably down with the market. So that's money that you're actually going to lock in those realized losses and therefore it doesn't have the ability to recover. I think beyond that, I'd love for you to just allow that money to continue to grow in there until you need it, either by converting it to an income stream or just letting it grow if you don't need to tap into it and you've got your expenses covered through other means. And especially given that you all are limiting your lifestyle, you have quite a bit of surplus left on a monthly basis, and you're already on track to get that paid off by early next year, I would say let's just continue to do that.

Leave this 457 alone and just let that continue to grow. That would be my preference. Okay, well, that sounds good.

That's kind of what I was thinking. I'm just so close, you know, I just want to, you'll be debt free, but I'll just do that and we'll have it done by the first of the year. Okay, I think that's a great plan. We appreciate your call today, Randy. God bless you, my friend. Thanks for being on the program. Quickly to Ohio.

Michelle, go ahead. Hi, thanks for taking the call. My concern is, my husband unexpectedly had to retire last year. He was well into, he had 30 years on the job, and so he was, he could have retired at any moment, but he had a stroke, so he had to retire. So he's, and I'm still working, and because our lifestyle changed dramatically in our circumstances, we have a home that's valued at like 550,000 that we paid off with some 401K money. But now that we've kind of lived in our situation, we feel we're in a way too big of a home, and we really don't want to be there. We really want to downsize and simplify.

So I'm not sure if I should sell the home and downsize and buy a smaller home cash, or put the money back in the stock market and just live off interest, because I don't want to, I only want to work for three more years and then I want to retire. I see. Okay. Yeah, very good. And your husband is not going to be able to go back to work, is that right?

No, he cannot, no. Okay. All right. And what is the value of the home?

Around 550. Okay. And what do you have left in retirement accounts?

We have about $90,000 left in 401K. Got it. All right, let's do this.

That's helpful background information. I've got to take a quick break, Michelle. But on the other side of this break, I'll give you my thoughts. We'll be right back on Faith and Finance Live. Stay with us. It's great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West. We're taking your calls and questions.

We have one line open, 800-525-7000. Just before the break, we were talking to Michelle in Ohio. Her husband had to unexpectedly retire. They used most of his 401K to pay off the home. Now they're realizing as she's nearing retirement here in the next few years that this home is probably a bit more than they need.

And so as they think about downsizing, she's wondering how to think about the asset that she has there and how to use the proceeds upon the sale. Michelle, I would start with what you expect your retirement expenses to look like. A lot of times folks will live on somewhere around 70-80% of their pre-retirement income in retirement just because they're not saving for retirement any longer.

Maybe they've dropped their life insurance. They're less commuting. There's various expenses that will either lower or go away. Have you looked at what your budget might be in that season once you're fully retired?

I'm trying to get there now while I'm still working. We don't have any expenses. We're debt-free, so I'm looking at minimum.

I don't know if you were talking about your must-haves as far as... I'm really looking at what is it going to take to fund your lifestyle, whatever that's going to be in retirement, and we're going to need to compare that to the assets that you have and the income sources you'll have. You're going to have roughly $90,000 in retirement assets plus what that grows to, and then you're going to have whatever's left over after you sell the current home and buy the next one.

That plus Social Security, I expect, will be your only income sources. So we're going to have to compare that to what it actually takes to fund your lifestyle or what you expect that to be in retirement just to see if we're on track ahead or behind for what you guys need to be able to fund your expenses. What do you expect to spend on this next home once you downsize?

Have you started looking, and do you have an idea yet? Yeah, we have looked and probably about half of the money would probably go to... Okay, so you think you'll spend about $225,000, is that right? Yeah.

Alright. Well, if you take that plus the $100,000 that you've got, and let's say over the next couple of years that's $325,000 today, let's say you do well and that grows to $400,000, that would throw off about $16,000 a year in income at 4% a year, where ideally it would be invested conservatively but with some income generation and some appreciation so you could maintain that $16,000 a year, or about $1300 a month as a withdrawal rate, and that's on $400,000, which I'm looking at the $225,000 if you were to have that left over after you buy this next home, plus the retirement assets that you have and what you'll add to that and what that will grow to over the next few years. Then the question is, is that $1300 a month plus Social Security going to be enough to cover your bills?

Would you expect that to be the case? Yes. To back up, we figured out that we could live on his salary, his pension alone, but it wouldn't leave any extra money. Okay. So he does have a pension, and is he also eligible for Social Security? No, because it's a privately funded pension.

They don't pay into Social Security. Yeah. Okay. And then what about you? Will you be eligible for Social Security? No, I will not. I'm not going to work until retirement age. Got it. Okay. But you do believe that his pension alone is going to be enough to cover your bills, so I think if that's the case, that puts you all in a really great spot, because even though I may not have encouraged you to pull all that money out of the 401k to pay off the mortgage, just given that now that money is not growing except in the house and we paid all the tax, that's behind us.

I think the opportunity you have now is to go and sell the house, downsize into something that fits your lifestyle and your needs from a space standpoint, and then you've got that plenty of liquidity that you can sock away to be invested, plus the $90,000 and whatever you'll add to it, and then that money can just continue to grow if your bills are covered through the pension, which gives you plenty of liquidity, and I think at that point you just need an advisor to manage that for you and pick the investments to maintain what you've got, but also to grow it. Does that make sense? Yes, and while I'm working these next few years, I've significantly increased my contributions since I don't really need the money. Yeah, that's great.

That'll help as well. Yeah, and you guys are proving this out, that you genuinely can live on just his income, which gives you a great opportunity during these remaining working years to sock away as much as you can. So I would kind of proceed with your plan.

It sounds good to me, and go ahead and buy that next house with cash, and then if you need an advisor to help you manage all of this, the proceeds after the home sale, plus the retirement investments, I'd just head to our website, faithfi.com, and click Find a CKA. Thanks for your call today. To Kansas, hi Darla, go right ahead.

Hi, this is Darla. I'm going to try to record this. Hold on. Okay. Okay, my husband was terminated yesterday.

He's given us two days to decide what we're wanting to do. He can take what they consider early retirement and do a pension that he would have to take a reduction from a penalty. But he has what's called CMT. It's like a multiple sclerosis, or muscular dystrophy, sorry, that we think we can do maybe disability on. But I don't know anything about that.

They said they would not commit unemployment. I don't know where to go. Okay. Well, you guys have a lot that you're dealing with right now.

What I'd like for you to do, I think because these are some pretty significant decisions, and we're going to have to understand what options are being given to him for the retirement account, plus the unemployment or disability benefits, and you've got a short window of time, I want to get you connected to an advisor. So you stay on the line. We'll talk a little bit more off the air. We'll be right back. Stay with us. Thanks for joining us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West. We're taking your calls and questions today. Let's head right back to the phones to Tennessee. Hi, Tony. How can I help you?

Yes, sir. I have a standard term life insurance policy of $100,000. And I'm 71 years old, and it's going to be expiring, I think, in 2028. And at my age, I know I'll probably never be able to afford another policy. And I've been hearing on the TV about these companies that will buy your insurance policy. And I don't understand how that would work.

And I just like some information about it, if you could give it to me. Yeah. You know, you can sell a life insurance policy. It's all going to have to do with the death benefit and just, you know, your health condition. If you have a terminal condition, obviously, the investor or investors that would be buying this policy are buying it for the death benefit, they would maintain the premium and then collect the death benefit upon your death. The question with you, you can sell a term insurance policy, which is, you know, temporary insurance because it meets a temporary need.

And then, you know, when you reach the end of the term, you know, you would you would drop it. You know, most significant disadvantage of a term insurance policy is that, you know, is that it can expire while the insured is still alive and it pays no death benefit or it lapses during that period of time. You know, if it's convertible to a whole life policy that would factor into this, obviously, as I said, your health and age would affect kind of your ability to get a life settlement.

And you'd have to see if you even qualify. So you'd want to look at, you know, because these can be somewhat complicated, you'd want to contact a life settlement company and have the policy appraised, you know, before you did anything. But I would typically say for the average person with a term policy, it's not going to make a whole lot of sense to sell this policy. And, you know, what you probably will end up doing is, like most folks with a term policy, is you have it to offset the risk that exists during your working years. But then when you get beyond that and there's not a risk that exists where if you were to pass away, it would create a hardship for a loved one or a dependent who's counting on your income because in retirement, you've already built up your retirement assets. So at that point, you'd typically just drop your term insurance policy and no longer be paying for it, which allows you to recoup that expense. So I would say, you know, it's probably not worth, you know, the option of selling it. But if you wanted to kind of hire somebody, a reputable broker to, you know, go out and get some offers for you and help understand, you know, what's available, I would try to get multiple offers on it. Get to know the process and, you know, have somebody look into that for you.

But it's likely not going to make sense with what you're describing. Yeah, well, I mean, what percentage do they pay? I'd like to say I've got a hundred thousand and it expires in, I think, five more years. Well, if they bought it, would I get the whole hundred thousand?

No, no, no, no, not anywhere close to that. I mean, it's typically it's between 10 to 25 percent. But again, just given that this is a term policy and not whole life, you know, depending on your health status. I mean, if you had a terminal condition with, you know, a very short time to live based on what the doctors were suggesting, then you might be able to get, you know, more than, you know, 10 or 20 percent in that situation. But if you're in fairly good health and this policy is only going to last another five years and you're in your 70s, you're going to be below. You know, this policy will run out before you even reach the average life expectancy, so you probably won't get very much at all. And the real benefit on this would come from just letting the policy lapse.

OK, that's kind of what I thought about, but I just wanted to hear your take on it because they don't really explain that. Yeah, I really appreciate the information and the other terms. I knew I was going to live this long and got me a better policy. Anyway. All right. Well, obviously, the Lord's not done with you yet, Tony.

He's still got some assignments for you. So we appreciate you being on the program today. Let's head to Florida. Hi, Missy. Go right ahead.

Hi there. I wanted to know if solar panels were a good investment together with the program that FPL offers. So the electric company has a program where they partner with you. And I was wondering if that was a good investment.

Yeah. You know, you really need to crunch the numbers to determine what your final cost will be and compare that to your monthly energy savings. So, for example, let's say the panels cost you sixteen thousand dollars and they save you two thousand dollars a year. Well, it'd take eight years to pay off the panel. And by the way, the panels and that's the average, by the way. So you'd want to do the math. And if it looks like you can break even by then, then, you know, it might be worth it if you're willing to put that initial investment into it.

You know, it has to you have to be in an area that gets a lot of sunshine, you know, so you're in a good part of the country for that. And you want to have very efficient panels at the best price and maximize all of the available government and private rebates that are out there. So it's going to require you to do a bit of homework. It's not a no brainer. You're going to need to look into it.

Do your research, make sure, you know, you get the sun you need, make sure you get the quality and efficiency of the panels, make sure you understand how to get all those rebates. And then ultimately it's going to come down to the math on the payback based on the savings that's available to you on an annual basis. Would you consider age of factor, say if we're in our sixties?

No, not necessarily. I mean, the key is, are you going to stay in the house? And if you plan to stay there for as long as the Lord has you here and, you know, you can get paid back on, you know, the investment in a reasonable time period, then I'd say, you know, go for it. If you plan to stay in this house, you know, let's say for the Lord Terry's and you're in good health, you might be there another 20 or 30 years. But, you know, if you thought there's a chance you might sell or downsize or move, you're probably not going to get the money out that you put into the panels. Clearly the longer you're going to be in the home, the better.

So, you know, it'd be better if you were 40 than 60, but it can still work as long as you crunch the numbers and there's enough savings there. Very good. Thanks so much. All right. Thank you for calling. We appreciate it. 800-525-7000. Let's head to Aurora, Illinois.

Hi, Chloe. Go ahead. Hi, I've just recently come into an inheritance. I've had a death in our family and a couple of questions. I've heard two different ways biblical ties on an inheritance.

Some people say no because you didn't earn it. Some people say yes, of course, you're going to tithe. Second part is the inheritance is a two part. One is cash and the other one is stocks and bonds and mutual funds.

That is not liquid. And how do I tithe on? I'm tithing on the cash. All right. I'll just say that much. But how do I tithe on the stocks and the bonds and all of that?

Yeah. Well, first, I would say if you're applying the principle of the tithe, which in truth is an Old Testament concept. There was three tithes for the Israelites totaling 23 and a third percent. But I love the idea of giving proportionately on your increase. And I would just say, well, what is your increase? And for me, that's anything that comes into your hand. It's all a gracious gift from God, whether it's wages or an inheritance or a gift.

It's an increase, in my opinion. So if you're going to apply the principle of the tithe, I would do it on the whole thing. It's easy on cash. I think if you're keeping the stocks, then I'd probably calculate your realized gains once a year and tithe on that.

If you're liquidating them, then you could just go ahead and tithe out of the proceeds. Hang on the line. We'll talk a bit more off the air. Thanks for joining us today on Faith and Finance Live. We've had some great calls today. We're continuing here in our last segment. Lines are full, so let's dive right back in.

Before the break, we were talking to Chloe and Aurora. She's received an inheritance, she and her husband, and they're wanting to tithe on this money. They've decided they're going to tithe on the full increase. A portion of it came in the form of cash, so that's easy. We can give a tenth right off the top. A portion of it, though, came in stock and investment holdings, and they're wondering kind of how to approach that.

So talk to me about that portion of it, Chloe. How are you receiving that, and what are you planning to do with it? Okay, I'm receiving that through, there's a trust fund that my father set up 26 years ago when he passed away, and it's coming to me now that my mother's passed away. So my mother's assets are liquid, and his are single stock and mutual funds, and I'm not sure what to do with all that. Okay, and are you all planning to make some changes in the portfolio to liquidate these holdings and reposition them, or do you think you'll just hold on to the current individual stocks? Yeah, we need to diversify those stocks. They're single stocks, and I'm not going to have something in my portfolio that I'm living and dying by the market.

I need more stability in that. So we're looking to liquefy that and add it to our retirement portfolio, but we just don't know where and when to tithe on that. Yeah, well, I would do it right away. I mean, it'd be one thing if you said, no, we just want to hold on to these stocks that we were inheriting from my dad, because now these are illiquid. Now, although you could donate the stocks themselves, but you don't need to do that necessarily because the basis on these was probably stepped up as of the date of death, although you'd want to run this by your CPA. But given that you're liquidating these holdings, that creates an opportunity before you redeploy that money to take a tenth of the total stock portion and give that as a tithe, and then that's done. And now we take the rest of it and you redeploy it either yourselves or through an advisor in a portfolio that's more consistent with your goals and objectives. But as you're repositioning and liquidating holdings, I think that's the opportunity to make that gift.

That's great advice. Thank you. Okay, Chloe, I appreciate your desire to honor the Lord in your giving, and thanks for being on the program today.

To Chicago. Hey, Linda, go right ahead. Good afternoon. Thank you for taking my call. I am calling because I am clueless as to what is going on with this account that my mother has. My mother is not able to take care of this, but my brother who lives out of state, you know, mailed these things, her mailings to me.

Insurance and papers, and I'm just overwhelmed with all of these papers, but listening to you the other day, and you're talking about spring cleaning, that's what I started doing. And I had gotten this paperwork from her, my brother, back in October, and it meant nothing to me. I just filed it away. But here in the program the other day, I looked through it, and I said I would call you to find out if this is really a true account. The name of the account is called TRUIST. Have you ever heard of TRUIST?

And it seems that mom has a check-in and money market and market savings account. Yes, that's Truist Bank. And so, Truist is the old sun trust, and they were bought out, and the new entity is called Truist Bank.

T-R-U-I-S-T. They're a major national bank. It's a relatively new name because it was as a result of a merger, but there wouldn't be any issue there. Yeah, this is just one of the financial accounts that your mom has, it sounds like. Okay, well, he sent me this in October, and like I said, I just filed it away. He sent me something in January, and I looked at it, and I asked him, is this any good?

And he said, yes, it is. He said, this is mother's account. But I still just filed it away, but after hearing the program talk about spring cleaning, I looked at it, and I said, I'm going to call and find out from you where I should go with this. I'd like to know how much my mother actually has in this account because the statements vary, and I just don't know what to do.

Yeah, so what's taken place here? So your brother is no longer managing her financial affairs, and that's been now transitioned over to you? Well, I don't know if he was even managing them then, but he was living at her house, but then she had to come and stay with me, so since she's staying with me, he sends me her mail-ins and paperwork. But you should get a monthly statement on all these accounts, which probably needs to be moved to your mailing address if that's where your mom now resides, and that should give you the most current information on all these accounts. I think your next step, Linda, is to start to make a listing, and it sounds like you've done that or you're in the process of doing it, of all of her assets and liabilities.

So you need to chase down all, and he can help you with this, all the various accounts that she has, checking accounts, savings accounts, any insurance policies that are out there, any retirement accounts, any income sources like Social Security. You need to get all that in one place and then decide how you need to proceed in order to manage this wisely. If it's fairly simple, maybe you do it yourself. If there's something that's a bit more complicated, you could avail yourself of an advisor who could help you with any investments or tax returns, things like that.

But I think the starting place is just to try to get a lay of the land and get all of this in one place with a detailed listing of assets and liabilities. I appreciate that very much. I will look into that, but I'll give you the heads up. You are my advisor, so I will do those things and check out with Truist. Okay, Truist. Yes, ma'am.

Very good. And if we can help further along the way, don't hesitate to reach out. Thank you for calling, Linda.

Let's stay in Illinois. Hi, Cynthia. Go right ahead. Hi, Rob. Thanks so much for taking my call today. Sure.

Yes, ma'am. I've been following you all for a while, and I'm just able to start listening sometimes while at work. I've gotten so much that I had to ask you now, you better work too, with insurance and all of that. But the biggest concern that I've heard about is that I lost my husband in 2014. At that time, I inherited the portion that he had contributed to his pension.

Okay. And then a couple of years after that, I discovered that I could buy back my own pension that I had when I was working, that I pulled out when I had surgery and resigned. I'm at a point now, I turned 61 last month. I'm in a stressful job that I could actually retire from now because of my age and the service years.

I think, for me, the biggest part is when my husband passed, reality slapped me in the face, and I really started to panic. So I actually, with another movie personnel, I went out and actually got a trust in the will and all that setup to try to put some things in place. I purchased cash, the home I'm living in now, with the insurance policy I had for my husband.

Okay. So I'm in a home that is totally paid for. When I purchased the home, I purchased it with my three children and all grandchildren in mind to leave something behind for them. My children about told me that they would not want to live in the house, but they don't want me to sell it. They want me to keep it there to use like an Airbnb or something like that.

What I want to find out about, because I'm really behind, I feel, I thought I was doing a whole lot to try to get on track and secure my future. But now I feel like I'm kind of drowning with all the things I have in place, but they're really not going anywhere. Is there anything I can do with the existing $48,000 that I had in the inherited IRA? I rolled it over to an IRA when I first inherited it when my husband passed.

And I have that sitting out there. I did buy my $3,000 in there. In fact, the stock last year, the neighborhood that's a high rate, I have that $3,000 sitting there to grow whatever interest income on that.

I'm somewhat fearful that if I walk away today from the job, of course, the air time that I'm used to living on, I will no longer have because it will be a minute. There's nothing else in place at this point, but the pension that I do have to draw from my company when I do retire at $48,000. Okay, so you have the $48,000 that you inherited plus your pension. Do you know what your options will be on that pension? Are they going to give you a lump sum or a monthly payout? I believe that I would have to take it as, I could take it as a lump sum, I believe, or as a monthly payout. And do you know what that amount would be that you'd get as a lump sum?

The last time I got a, we get the resource, we get like the reports twice a year, I believe. And the amount that they're talking is nowhere near what I'm used to living off of. I'm thinking that it's probably only going to be about $3,000 a month, get that.

Okay. So that's about $3,000 a month. Okay, do you know what the lump sum payout would be?

No, not offhand. Okay, and what about, what is your age? Sixty-one. Sixty-one?

Yes. Okay, so you're still a good ways off from Social Security. Yeah, I mean, I think the key here is to do some planning, Cynthia, and perhaps getting you with a Certified Kingdom Advisor, because what we need to look at is what are your expenses going to be in retirement? What will you get either as a lump sum or a monthly payout from the pension? The $48,000 in the inherited IRA, that's only going to throw off another couple of thousand dollars a year, maybe a couple of hundred a month. So let's say you're at $3,200 a month on the annuity plus an income stream from the $48,000 or a lump sum, but I don't want you to run through that money too quickly. I want that money to last.

So I think what you're going to need to do, if you can, is just to continue to work as long as you can to get as close to full retirement age or at full retirement age of 66 or 67 so that you give the $48,000 a chance to grow and you can earn Social Security at the full amount, and hopefully Social Security plus your pension plus whatever that IRA grows to over the next five years, that should do it. The only other thing I would say is let's not focus on keeping the house for the kids. Let's keep you in the right house that fits your budget. Stay on the line. We'll talk more off the air, and that's going to do it for us. Faith and Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and Faith by thank you to my team and thank you for being with us. We'll see you tomorrow. Bye bye.